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Sunday, August 23, 2015

Magic And Science

Magic is a theme that has played a dominant role in all four
of my novels. I’m not sure how the idea of magic has woven its way into my
thinking but it has, and I continue to find new ways to interpret it. I’ve seen
many of my favorite artists latch upon a single idea and go back to it again
and again. A good idea, a unique paradigm, is worthy of being mined again and
again.

My main characters are magicians but my books aren’t so much
about the performing of tricks on stage. Nor are they the kind of magicians
that go to Hogwarts and turn people into animals. No, they are quite human
people without any special powers. Except, perhaps, perception. They are able
to see life in a way few people take the time to, are able to see beyond the
accepted realities that have been built by a sort of group think. They walk
paths off the beaten trail and so are able to see the things other people are
too busy, too herded, to see. After all, being a magician is not a normal
profession. It is perhaps something we think of doing when we’re young, but
eventually we grow up and get real jobs.

But there is something to the illusion, the sleight of hand.
We want to know how the trick is done but we also want to believe that there’s
something more than a trick involved. Sure, we know it’s not real, but it’s not
really about reality, is it? There is something beyond the reality, or something
that is real but not conforming to what we generally agree upon as “real”. What
is truly magical, miraculous, is what takes place within us as we observe a
trick being performed. That is where magic exists, within us, in our hearts and
in our minds when we are able to observe things with un-jaded eyes. And that
area where magic exists is an area quite foreign from science or objective observation.
It has its own reality that can run concurrent to what we can quantify but
exists slightly apart from it. It is a world of belief and faith just as it is
a place that permits doubt and questioning of what the rest of the world
accepts as solid fact. You see, when we believe, when we have faith, we are
able to achieve many things that the outside world may say is impossible. And
when we doubt what is accepted fact, we are able to overcome barriers that
others never try to overcome. Indeed, many of us are never even aware that the
barriers are there. I have noticed a growing idea that there is no such thing
as free will. And for those who do not believe in free will it truly does not
exist. You have to be able to see beyond the existing paradigms in order to
overcome them.

Hundreds of years ago religion was misused in order to restrict
people’s reality. All of the advances of science would have then been
considered impossible given the limits that were placed upon free thought. But
scientists pushed bravely onwards and built an entirely new world beyond the
imagining of anyone living a few centuries ago.

But now ironically science itself is often used as a
bludgeon to try to prevent us from seeing beyond the walls that have been
constructed around us. Science has constructed rules and laws in the same
fashion as religion once did. You see, no matter how enlightened we may believe
ourselves to be, we cannot remove humans from the equation, their imperfections
and unpredictability. Which is bad as far as science is concerned, but it’s
where magic is able to flourish.

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Shell Shock

The Amazing Morse

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Perchance To Dream

Seven Stones

About Me

The Amazing MorseThe Amazing Morse is a blog dedicated to my works of fiction, primarily my first series, The Amazing Morse. My postings will be either from my own perspective or that of my character Dave Morse.